


Middle Watch

by Verecunda



Category: Treasure Island - Robert Louis Stevenson
Genre: Fluff, M/M, Missing Scene
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-05
Updated: 2016-01-05
Packaged: 2018-05-11 21:10:15
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,035
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5642089
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Verecunda/pseuds/Verecunda
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>There is nothing quite like the threat of imminent attack by pirates for unburdening one's soul.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Middle Watch

**Author's Note:**

> A/N: I love these two, and have so many headcanons about them, you've no idea. I’m just trying my hand writing them for the first time. And I’m a big softie for first kisses, _so_.
> 
> Content warning: contains mild references to PTSD.

David Livesey was an old soldier, but for all that, no watch or piquet had ever prepared him for standing the middle watch on Treasure Island. He sat on the threshold of the blockhouse, his musket half-cocked and leaning against his shoulder, his wig lying in his lap as he smoked, looking out into the night. At every hand, the surf boomed and rasped, and the wind sounded a thin, forlorn cry through the dark trees beyond the stockade, raising a sense of desolation deeper and lonelier than he had ever known. From time to time, the cry of an unknown bird would pierce through the night: now a mournful call, now an almost maniacal chittering that set the teeth on edge. But these, he knew, were merely the fancies of the unknown working upon him. Far more chilling, and more certainly dangerous, were the raucous voices of the mutineers down by the shore, rising drunkenly as they sang their villainous songs.

“They certainly sound in high spirits.” Trelawney’s voice came out of the shadows behind him.

Livesey took his pipe from his mouth. “You should be asleep. It will be your watch soon enough.”

Trelawney came forward, out onto the porch, and sat down beside him, rather heavily. “To tell you plain, Livesey, I don’t think I shall get much in the way of sleep tonight.”

Livesey understood. He doubted he should sleep very soundly, either, though he had no immediate fears of their being attacked in the night. By the sound of it, the mutineers were far more concerned with drinking themselves into sordid oblivion. But he could not forbear observing, “You must rest. You are the best shot out of all of us, and you will be no good to us if your wits are addled come the morning.”

Trelawney cocked his head to him with a sad smile. “Well, you are in the right of it, I’m sure, but if I must spend another hour tossing and turning, my wits will be addled beyond repair.”

He looked out into the darkness beyond the blockhouse, out towards the place where they had buried poor Tom Redruth. In the low light cast by the embers of their hearth-fire, Livesey watched his face over his pipe - that absurdly, touchingly open face. Trelawney was a man of big emotions, and in all the time he had known him, Livesey had never once known him to be capable of hiding them. He could see how they affected Trelawney now. He had been very white all day, and his eyes still showed red around their edges. Even the firelight conspired to deepen the lines of his face, making him look older, tired.

“Poor old Redruth,” he said, very low. “He was with our family long before I was born, you know; a second father to me, really. It was Tom who taught me how to shoot.” With the shadow of a laugh, he added, “He would box my ears until they rang if ever I let the gunpowder get damp, or left in my ramrod. But I learned so much about the estate from him. He taught me so much.”

Livesey smiled to himself, quite able to conjure up the image of rough-hewn old Redruth knocking seven bells out of the young John. He had only ever met Trelawney’s father - the old squire - once, years ago, but even that had been sufficient for him to form an impression of a cold, lofty figure, distant from his son. As far as he knew, Trelawney had always been closer to Redruth and the servants of the Hall, and there remained an enduring bond of genuine affection between them.

He sent a covert look across to Trelawney, and saw his face had become very old and grave once more.

“You must not blame yourself, John,” he said softly.

“Oh, how can I not?” The retort was torn from Trelawney in honest anguish, and Livesey had to press an urgent finger to his lips, lest he wake the others. Happily, he hadn’t pitched his voice quite loud enough, and he was heard only by Gray on the other side of the blockhouse, who spared just a brief startled look in their direction before turning away to resume his own intent, anxious watch of the woods.

“How can I not?” said Trelawney again, this time in a fierce whisper. “It’s my own intolerable foolishness that’s put us all in danger: you, Livesey, and now poor Redruth killed, and young Hawkins has had a devil of a time of it.”

“But he has returned to us, quite safe,” said Livesey, “and with information we may profit by.”

“True, true. He’s a good lad.” He looked back into the house. “Asleep, I see.”

“Yes,” said Livesey, with a fond smile toward the place where Jim slept, covered by an old boat-cloak. Brave lad, he had endeavoured to stand watch with them, but his ordeals of the day had left him weary to the bone, and he had dozed off soon enough. “I thought it best not to wake him.”

“Quite right, quite right.”

“And as for your other points,” said Livesey, turning them back to their original theme, “Redruth bore you no grudge at the end, and nor should you. And,” he added tartly, “I may say that I can look danger in the face with as much equanimity as the next man.”

He had hoped he would never have to do so again. With his discharge from the army he had sworn to put that part of his life behind him, to devote himself to healing his fellow man, rather than harming him. He looked down at his wig, that material proof of his pledge, unable to hold back a sigh as he smoothed it with his fingers. Between the ducking it had undergone when the jolly-boat sank, the sweat and the heat and the exertion of the day, it was in a sad state, most of the powder knocked clean out of it, and as it lay in his lap it looked like nothing so much as one of last year’s bird’s nests sagging in the hedgerow back home, sticking up in a dozen places. A grim, almost Providential remark upon the state of his situation: his physician’s wig lying ragged on his knees, and a musket loaded in his hand.

When the fighting began, as it inevitably must, he would of course do his duty. He had gladly left behind the life of a soldier, but there were some things one could never forget, and one of those was how to stand firm in line, load and shoot, load and shoot, while the enemy’s fire raged all around. Memories of Fontenoy flared up unbidden, a tumult of smoke and blood. Even now, all these years later, his mind shied away from it. To distract himself, he tapped out his pipe upon the threshold.

Trelawney was not so deeply entrenched in his own self-reproach that he could not sense Livesey’s discomfort, and with a sudden movement he pulled in close, closing his hand around Livesey’s wrist and looking earnestly into his face.

“I assure you, I reproach myself bitterly for putting you in this abominable situation.”

Dear man! It won a smile from Livesey, despite everything.

“With all respect, squire, I believe it was Silver who put us in this situation.”

“Oh, don’t coddle me, Livesey! You said yourself that I should have kept my blasted mouth shut.”

“Well,” Livesey conceded, “I could wish that you were not so cursed loose-lipped... but I have the feeling that Silver would have caught wind of our plans, whether you had spoken or not. He is an intelligent man, I’ll say that for him.”

“He may be that,” said Trelawney hotly, “but I tell you, sir, I am all afire to get a good shot at the dog!”

“That’s the spirit.” A damnably excitable Trelawney was infinitely preferable to a Trelawney downcast and dispirited. “For my own part, I would be quite content never to fire a musket in anger again. But what must be must.”

This time, Trelawney’s hand clasped his, hard. “Upon my honour,” he cried, “if we should get out of this mess with our hides intact, I will make it up to you. I’ll even buy you a new wig - a hundred wigs, if you like!”

Livesey shook his head. “If I get off this island with the loss of no more than a wig, I shall consider it a triumph.” He quirked another smile. “But I thank you for the offer.”

“The very least I can do,” said Trelawney. “Livesey, you can’t begin to guess what I have been thinking these past hours. If anything should happen to you, I should never forgive myself, and that’s a fact.”

Livesey set down his musket and took Trelawney's hand in both his own, such a warmth of love and gratitude rising within him. Trelawney’s hand was warm and rough and familiar, and he found himself most reluctant to let it go. Over the years, he had done a tolerable job of convincing himself that his affection for John Trelawney was no more than that of one old friend to another, folding it up and tucking it away as neatly as he might a handkerchief. But it was in moments such as this, when Trelawney was at his most uncomplicated, honestly good, that Livesey knew it was mere foolishness to deny it. Now, surrounded as they were by cut-throats, he cherished that goodness all the more. It was a comfort after all that happened today, and all that was certain to happen tomorrow. He recalled those gloomy days he had spent recovering after returning from the Continent. It was Trelawney who had pulled him out of his despondency and set him back on his feet. So he was cheered now.

He met Trelawney’s gaze over their joined hands, and they exchanged a smile. There was no cause to talk of what might happen to either of them tomorrow. The shared closeness was enough. So natural was it, that neither of them were truly sensible of it until the space between them closed altogether.

Truthfully, it was not much of a kiss - barely a heartbeat, a swift grazing of lips, the breath coming warm between them, Trelawney’s unshaven cheek rough as it glanced against his own. A stolen moment, no more, then they broke away, both of them glancing sharply back into the house. But the sleepers slumbered on, and Gray - dutiful man - had not broken his watch from the loophole opposite. They both let out a breath, relief and resignation mingling, and dared look back at each other.

“You scoundrel,” Livesey murmured. “I had no notion, none at all.”

“And you say I cannot keep a secret, eh, Doctor?”

“Clearly we must take this as the exception that proves the rule.”

“Hmph!” snorted Trelawney. “You’re a fine one to talk. Had you not been so deuced secretive, I might have declared my intentions sooner.”

Livesey raised an eyebrow. “Honourable intentions, I trust?”

“Never believe it, sir!”

They laughed together, a true laugh that even diverted Gray momentarily from his vigil. As he returned to it, they shared a covert smile, and a marvellous sense of understanding passed between them.

“Livesey,” Trelawney began, “when we get back home -”

“One thing at a time,” Livesey put in quickly. “Don’t you suppose we should attend to the matter at hand, before we make any rash, intemperate declarations? Myself, I find our present setting dismally unsuited to the scene.”

At these words, Trelawney looked briefly put out, but he recovered quickly, chuckling. “God’s my life, Livesey, you can be a perfect humbug when you choose. But I daresay you’re right. One thing at a time. I may explode, but I shall hold my tongue for now. But I declare, Doctor, as soon as we are safely away from here, I will press my suit with uncommon vigour.”

Livesey smiled. “I depend upon it, sir.”

With that, their covenant was sealed, and for what remained of the watch they sat in wonderfully companionable silence, there on the threshold.


End file.
